Understanding Social VR Streamers’ Unique Challenges in Managing Cross-Reality Social Interactions Through Multi-dimensional VR Interfaces

Cross-reality interaction is a novel paradigm where users traverse and collaborate across virtual and physical realities. While prior research has investigated cross-reality systems through controlled experimental settings, how people navigate cross-reality interfaces in real-world contexts remains understudied. In this work, we focus on social VR streaming, an emerging practice where streamers engage in immersive VR activities while audiences view through traditional 2D interfaces. Through 17 interviews with experienced social VR streamers, we uncover their unique challenges in managing interfaces that span different realities to facilitate cross-reality interactions. We also highlight nuanced design spaces to facilitate cross-reality social engagement by addressing the difficulty to use and arrange existing 2D professional software within immersive 3D environments and the difficulty to maintain more natural and intuitive cross-reality interactions through everyday technologies rather than specialized hardware solutions. These insights advance our understandings of cross-reality interactions beyond experimental settings and can inform future interface design to better support everyday users' experiences of such interactions.